yeah, I figure I'll just replace it with a new three tier one better suited to my 1875 745t when I have some extra dough to throw at it, but want to drain all the life out of the existing one first. Figure I can get another 20k or so at least out of this one... at 210k now.

the radiator stuff is nasty, but its not as bad as I thought. When I flushed the coolant system 5 months ago I found some of teh material in places where it could hang up like the stat, etc. However, its incredibly fine and small, and it doesn't seem to cause any problems.

amusing thing though... I flushed the car and then found the leak in the radiator. asked my dad (PO) and it seems he had done teh same before... I had simply washed out his patch in my attempt to clean out the nasty coolant.

I found some of the gunk in the expansion cap (black cap). Is it possible the overflow left some gunk in the cap that affected its performance?

thanks,
-rt